Iguatemi SA

BOVESPA:IGTI3

Earnings Call Transcript 2022-Q4

[Operator]

Good morning, everyone, and thank you for holding. We would like to welcome you to Iguatemi S.A. fourth quarter 2022 results conference call.

With us here today, we have Ms. Cristina Betts, the CEO and Guido de Oliveira, CFO and Investor Relations Officer.

As a reminder, this event in being recorded. [Operator Instructions] This event is also being broadcast live via webcast and may be accessed through Iguatemi's website www.iguatemi.com.br/ri, where the slide presentation is also available for download. Participants may view the slides of their own convenience.

Before proceeding, bear in mind the forward of statements are based on the beliefs and assumptions of Iguatemi's management and on information currently available to the company. They involve risks, uncertainties and assumptions as they relate to future events and therefore, depend on circumstances that may or may not occur. Investors and analysts should understand that overall economic conditions, industry conditions and other operating factors could also affect the future results of Iguatemi and cause these results to differ materially from those expressed in such forward-looking statements.

We will now turn the floor over to Ms. Cristina Betts, who will begin the presenting. Ms. Betts, you may proceed.

[Cristina Betts, executive]

Good morning to all of you. It's a pleasure to be here once again for the close of the fourth quarter '22. I'm going to begin speaking about the quarter. We ended the year with a sequence of very positive results and robust growth as you will see during the presentation. You must have read this in the release. We had a record of sales. The sales were highly positive in the fourth quarter, and we began 2023 with a positive trend, surpassing our results and -- results and FFO. We're quite optimistic regarding 2023.

Our audience seems to be very resilient when it comes to inflation and interest rates, a very blue horizon that we see at the beginning of the year. A growth of 24% compared to '21 and 33% compared to 2019. We have already released and disclosed our guidance for 2023 as promised. And we will speak about the growth of net revenue between 3% and 8%, a growth in the Retail unit between 2% and 7%, EBITDA margin for the Shopping Malls between 68% and 71%, and EBITDA margin at 72%, with a quite controlled CapEx, as you will see.

As I mentioned, we had a very incredible sales performance during the year and a record of BRL 17 billion sales in 2022. And in the fourth quarter, we're quite satisfied with the results, and there's more to come. In terms of rents and store owners extremely sound indicators. When we look at the same-store rent growing 60% above the fourth quarter '19. We were able to capture the GPN plus a positive addition. And of course, all of this comes from the very positive sales results. This is not easy when compared to '21, a growth of 20%.

Well, even with this increase in lease because of the sales and the work of condominium, the colors have remained quite stable. And we ended the year within our normal limits. 2022 for us showed a year without interruption by COVID. This was the year where we had no lockdown since 2022 vis-a-vis 2021 and '20. We had no interruptions, lockdowns despite the fright of Omicron at the beginning of the year, there were no further interferences. And this allows for the resumption of our events, which is 1 of the strong points of our malls. It brings in flow, more energy. And at the end of the year, we had our Christmas Parades that are always very important in all of our ventures.

And as always, since the beginning, we had Sao Paulo Fashion Week with our brand and, of course, involving our business. Now this year, for the first time, we hosted several Sao Paulo Fashion Week runoffs within their headquarters, which I think is very interesting. We do want to continue with this. We want to continue giving thrust to the events in 2023. There is a connection between the events and the flow of the shopping mall because of the media, and there should be an increase in 2023 on that front.

We completed the purchase of JK Iguatemi Mall where we obtained the asset and that was completed in November 30 and December already had 1 month of results of the JK Shopping Mall at 100%. This week, the financial completion of the deal, the cash to pay the purchase of JK came out of our cash this last week. We turned the year with a very positive cash in terms of financial revenue.

For the first time, as we had mentioned in the third quarter and this is also valid for the fourth quarter, we had the Iguatemi Collections. It is a gamification program within our ventures with incredible results. For those who do not know about this, we changed the invoices for collectibles. They could be accumulated with the [ Naman ] Crystals as well as with bags and things of Mandarina Duck and this encompassed our entire network. To give you an idea, we had an increase of more than 10 percentage points identified in Iguatemi thanks to these collections.

I have since 1 of the great strides of our program. And we do intend to continue with 2 additions of collections every year. We will begin the second edition in March.

Iguatemi 365 with good results, although we do have a technical stop, as I mentioned, to be able to change the platform and adapt some of the processes. This is something that began at the end of 2022. We had an important year in terms of number of SKUs, especially in fashion in very important brands such as [indiscernible], and we increased our reach to areas that are normally not serviced by our brick and mortar network. As a result of this we had a GMV of almost 100%.

We celebrated the anniversary of the site in October, it began in 2019 and a very positive Christmas and Black Friday, positive, not only in sales, and without incidents of breakage of stock and an increase in our Net Promotor Score. Additionally to that, now to speak about the optimization of the company structure, at the end of the year, we had significant restructuring of the company or say to take advantage of tax credits that are a legacy of the structuring that we carried out last year. We will refer to this further ahead, but the results were important to make the best use of some tax credits and the company.

Had we not done this, we would still have them on our balance sheet with a significant fiscal impact.

When we speak about ESG, of course, we're very committed. This semester for the first time, we're going to issue our ESG report speaking about risks and much more. In 2022, we became part of the ICO2 carbon index of the B3 and you will be able to see in our report our commitment to reduce emissions and a preparation for lower carbon emissions in the company.

Internally, we're working on our diversity issues and we speak to people about what it means to have diversity. People have heard the word, but they don't know how it operates. And it's important to understand each of the issues of diversity, what they represent to our goals and much more, and we had the launch of this, this quarter.

Well, as of this point, I would like to say that I'm extremely satisfied with the close of 2022. We have a very resilient portfolio. We're well positioned for 2023 and very confident with our guidance of attaining it and working ever more better, which is something we know how to do.

Well, with this, we will go on to the presentation. We go straight to Slide #3 that I had already mentioned, our sales performance. This is the process that we began to share with you in 2021 when we began increasing our sales. And we forget the effects that we had of the pandemic very quickly. We left with 65% of the sales vis-a-vis 2019 and '20, '23, 131% of the sales vis-a-vis 2019. When we see the results of the fourth quarter '22, we have total sales of BRL 17 billion, a growth of 33% vis-a-vis '21 and 24% vis-a-vis 2019, 5.3% growth in the semester and 23% vis-a-vis the fourth quarter of '19.

Obviously, excluding the sold in 2019 in the same stores, a growth of 25%, same area stores, 23% vis-a-vis 2019, same-store rent, growth of 60%. Same area rent a growth of 45% in the quarter. And Guido in the presentation will refer to the fourth quarter. For the first part in the -- after the pandemic, the same area rent has been growing more compared to same area stores, which is very relevant revenue reaching BRL 1.2 million 24% above 2021. And BRL 351 million with a growth of 10% compared to 2021 and 10% over 2019.

Net revenue reaching BRL 1 billion in 2022, 18% above 2021. And I'm very happy that this year, we're going to leave behind through '19 and compare ourselves with other years, BRL 290 million in the fourth quarter, somewhat below 7.5% lower versus the fourth quarter of '21 and 38% versus fourth quarter '18. Net revenue reached BRL 1.1 billion, 39% above 2021 and BRL 304 billion in the fourth quarter '22, 16.7% higher versus the fourth quarter '21.

EBITDA reaching BRL 714 million in '22, an increase of 59% over 2021, an increase of 35% versus fourth quarter '21, and 40% compared to fourth quarter '19, excluding the straight line effect. We have 230% increase in adjusted net income of BRL 122 million in the quarter, 936% above the fourth quarter '21, 75% of 2019, excluding the straight-line effect infra commerce and the share SWAP results.

Adjusted FFO reaching BRL 422.3 million, 79% higher than 2021, 14% above 2019 and BRL 162 million in the fourth quarter, 215% higher than the fourth quarter of '21. The leverage of Iguatemi ended at 1.79x net debt over EBITDA or 0.05 points below the third quarter '22. Completion of the purchase of 36% of the shopping JK Iguatemi. We launched the Sky Galleria, the corporate icon in front of the galleria shopping. It has 87% of the private area sold. And this has already had an impact on the Shopping Mall. It is a very qualified region and incredible tower with fantastic visibility. You can see it kilometers away when you're up Shopping Mall.

I spoke about the carbon efficient index yesterday at the board and before the general assembly. Now, we approved dividend of the BRL 110 million, we will be paying every quarter. Iguatemi was elected as the seventh best company to work for by the Great Place to Work in the retail category, a reason of pride. We went from the tenth position to the seventh this year. And as I mentioned, payment for the acquisition of JK Iguatemi was carried out yesterday.

To speak about our ongoing projects. Here, we have the sale of tractions of land, the -- all of this accounted for in the fourth quarter. A tower in Ribeirao Preto and another in Iguatemi Esplanada and Sorocaba. You can see slides. One is a corporate venture, the other residential venture and some land.

I would like to give the floor to Guido for the financial results.

[Guido de Oliveira, executive]

Good morning, everybody. I would like to speak about our financial results beginning on Slide 10. When we compare the fourth quarter with '21 and 2019, a variation is because of the Galleria Tower inaugurated at the end of the third quarter. It hasn't us much revenue in the fourth quarter, but all of this was carried out during the second semester, and they will begin to have an impact in the revenues in the first quarter of '23.

As Cris mentioned, total sales reaching a record BRL 5.3 million, 10.7% above 2021. In 2021, our sales had already been a record compared to 2019 with a growth of almost 12% vis-a-vis 2019. It shows you that our growth of 22% over 2019 was 23%. We had the best quarter in the sector because of our international sales. Our international sales are an important part of our portfolio.

Same-store sales reaching 8.9%. Based on a very strong fourth quarter compared to 2019, a growth of 27%, a growth of 60% when compared with 2019 with a real increase of 4% over IGP-M when we compare the 36 months ending in 2019 with fourth quarter 2019 and 15.6% of real gain compared to 2021, a very strong figure.

As Cris mentioned, this is the first quarter since the pandemic where same area rent comparing Mall and Mall, same area sales are above same-store sales. It shows the strength of our shop owners. And with this range above same-store rent, this increases our future lease base and of course will increase revenues. It shows you we have been very efficient in reducing churn and the vacant areas in our shopping malls.

Now with this strong sales, we are at 11.8%, a growth of only 0.5 vis-a-vis the fourth quarter '21. Extremely sound results and quite calm when we consider our historical occupancy rates. Added to the strong sales and the strong occupancy rates, we have 3.8% in terms of net delinquency rates, minus 3.8%. This is thanks to the work carried out. And in the fourth quarter 2022, we had figures that were lower than those of the pre-pandemic in 2018 and 2019.

In January and February breakdowns, the levels are better compared to 2019 and 2018, showing you the strength of the sales in our portfolio. Now this is due to the strong work of our legal department in recovering all of the delinquency that was judicialized. In 2022 we're able to retrieve more than BRL 70 million and, of course, improve the net delinquency rate.

We go on to the next Page #11, where we show you the financial results compared to the fourth quarter of '21 and the fourth quarter '19. I think the main points were shown by Cris. Net revenue, although it had a drop vis-a-vis 2021 is due to the linearization effect. In the years '20 and '21, we offered significant discounts. The amortization of the discounts were positive throughout 2021.

In 2022, with the withdrawal of this discount, the linearization ended up being negative. The growth of net revenue was up 16% for the quarter and vis-a-vis 2019, 43%. Cost and expenses compared with 2021 are quite aligned compared to 2019 with an effect of the Iguatemi 365. This is when we inaugurated Iguatemi 365 at the end of 2019. We will show you this separately.

In other areas, an improvement in resales and because of the sale of 2 fractions of land in Esplanada, we had a positive effect. EBITDA BRL 187 million. If we withdraw the effects of linearization, discounts and other revenues, we have an adjusted EBITDA of BRL 203 million. Now financial revenues impacted by the increase of SELIC.

In 2022, the rate was 12.4% vis-a-vis an average rate of 4.5%. This increases financial expenses and costs. We highlight the fair value of capital instruments because of a balance of cap operations that we should reduce throughout the year and transfer all of this for investments as we have done with e-commerce. And this will no longer have impact on the balance after the end of the third quarter '22. After fourth quarter, this impact has been eliminated.

Well, with the acquisition of JK Mall and our work on tax credits, we were able to activize our physical losses. This generated significant losses between deferred income tax. It was positive in BRL 24 million. We have a positive result at the end compared to profit before income tax.

We go on to the next slide showing you the fourth quarter without the straight line effect. Our EBITDA reaching BRL 203 million compared to the EBITDA of '21 of BRL 150 million and compared to 2019 without the effect of the sales carried out in 2019, with a growth of 35% of EBITDA over 2021 and 40% vis-a-vis 2022. We reached net revenue of BRL 122 million and an FFO in the fourth quarter of BRL 162 million. And the FFO for the year is BRL 442 million. A strong growth, of course, for the market because of how we made the best use of everything.

And in the coming years, we should have a better tax rate because of this activation and the tax planning carried out by the company.

We go on to Slide #13, where we speak about the iRetail and Iguatemi results. In the fourth quarter, we had the best revenue for this segment, historical results reaching BRL 46 million. In the third quarter, the revenues had been 35%, a growth of 29%. As Cris mentioned, we had very strong growth. GMV grew 100% vis-a-vis 2021. The EBITDA is negative by BRL 13 million. Now if we eliminate ad hoc impacts in the third quarter, this amount would be BRL 9.5 million, a negative margin of 25%, similar to that of the third quarter.

During the year, the margin of 365 compared to 2021 fell -- sorry, improved from 43% negative to 40%. And as we have been mentioning, in 2023, we're working on the efficiency of this platform and throughout 2023, we should have at least half of this BRL 46 million that we made during 2022.

We go on to the next slide, #14, where we show you the shopping malls with a record margin of 81%, a growth of EBITDA of 36.5% vis-a-vis 2021, 40% vis-a-vis 2019. Costs and expenses with a growth of 2.1% vis-a-vis 2021, quite aligned as we will explain further on and a growth of 33% vis-a-vis 2019. Because of the inflation effects and the new areas and new customer demands, because of the present day, compliance, ESG and the reinforcement of our commercial area, but a very strong growth, and we have preserved strong margins of 81%.

We go on to Page #15, showing you the growth -- revenue growth separated by rentals, management fees, parking and malls and others. We are quite happy with the end of the pandemic at the end '22 and the percentage of Parking over gross revenue is returning to the historical levels of 60% to 70% of gross revenue. During we stood '20 and '21, we stood at 10% because of the closing of the malls and the lower flow.

When we look at the growth of Parking in 2022 compared to '21, a growth 18.5%. Compared to 2019, a growth of 11.2%. The flow in 2022 was still somewhat below that of 2019, perhaps 5%, but because of the work and the increase of fees, we have recovered this, and we're now charging for parking in Ribeirao Preto that began in January of 2022.

Strong growth in Rentals, 11% vis-a-vis 2021. And despite a flat occupancy rate, we have had same store rent that was very strong. And of course, this had a positive impact on growth. And we passed on 100% of our IGP-M at this point.

On Slide #16. Here, you see the breakdown of our rental revenue for malls. Compared to 2019 growth of 44%, a strong growth of minimum monthly rent of 48.2% and the strong growth of the percentage rate vis-a-vis 2019. Cris and myself have been speaking about the change of international paradigm that brought very strong growth. Compared to 2021, we had a growth of 14% in minimum rental. A drop in the percentage, but this drop in the percentage is because the reduction of discounts throughout 2022.

In the second half of 2022, especially in the second quarter, our indicator of discounts vis-a-vis overage and minimal rental was lower than before the pandemic. The situation was not different in January and February. Our discounts are lower than those of 2018 and 2019 in percentages. This shows the soundness of our store owners.

We're going to speak about media events that you will see here, a growth of 30% over 2019, 23% over 2022. Now the strength of media and the shopping mall is very strong. This is a strategy that we tend to resort to in all of the markets and malls. All of our stores have been quite full in November and December. And in Sao Paulo Capital, and in other markets, our shopping malls were completely crowded because of the events. And of course, we're going to continue this, this year. We're doing very well in terms of events.

We go on to Slide #17 to speak about the cost of malls, a growth of 14% in costs vis-a-vis '20, 21% and 31% vis-a-vis 2019. As part of costs, we have the increase in personnel because we have reinforced our commercial and operations team because of the resumption of shopping at 100% and a commercial search to fill in our vacant areas. And of course, we have now in-source brokers that used to be third-party services.

Now the third-party services have all been transferred to our in-house brokers. We're speaking of almost BRL 3 million, and our cost of personnel would be BRL 7 million. Additionally to that, the bargaining -- collective bargaining, vacations compared to '22 and 2019. Parking increases offset with the growth of revenues. And these increases are due to the collection in Ribeirao and Ribeirao Preto shopping malls. And of course, we have to hire more people to be able to do this.

And the other costs compared to 2021, a vacant area that was recovered and compared to 2019 and occupation of 94%. That is why we have an increase in the vacant area after 3 years, because the cost of these malls haven't increased during this period.

We go on to Slide #18 to speak about the expenses of Iguatemi. The shopping mall company removing i-retail and Iguatemi 365, we had a growth of 36.8% over 2021, a drop of 15% vis-a-vis 2021 because of the restructuring. Some provisions were made paid out during 2022. And of course, remuneration paid to executives that left and were replaced in the company, because of the incorporation of the Iguatemi S.A. This brought a drop in the recovery of suits for third parties and the growth in our payroll compared to 2021.

In 2020, we had carried out a layoff in the company because of the effects of the pandemic. And with the resumption of the malls at 100% and the growth of malls throughout 2021, we were forced to reposition these areas. This was done throughout 2022, leading to a growth in our payroll. And we also have to face the new demands that have been created in governance, the committees that we created and compliance, reinforcement of internal audits and ESG management. That is why we have this impact throughout the fourth quarter. Because of this fantastic year of 2022, we had an increase of provisions in the fourth quarter. We provisioned at 100%. And for the company as a whole, it stood at 70% for the bonuses that will be paid out now in March.

We go on to slide referring to our debt balance. We have a net debt of BRL 1.193 billion as net debt. If we take into account the acquisition of JK carried out on November 1, but the payment was only carried out yesterday, February 28. Our leverage would be at around 2.7x. With the acquisition of JK carried out yesterday, as we have already mentioned, we had already contracted a real estate company with Bradesco, carried out the swap of this operation based on CDI. And with this, our costs that were up 106% are now 104% of CDI. And the tenor of the debt goes on to 4 months.

With this, I would like to end my presentation. No, I'm sorry, I need to present the guidance, which is our last slide. When we look at the guidance for 2023, we have gone back to the guidance after 3 years of pandemic 2020, '21, '22. As always, we have the short-term guidance. In our guidance, we begin with the Shopping Malls with an estimated growth 13% to 18%. This is the guidance for Retail growth of 3% and 6%. EBITDA margin for Malls between 71% and 81%. The margin of this year was around 80%, and total EBITDA margin standing at 69% or 72%. And our investments between BRL 140 million and BRL 180 million.

This is an investment guidance that does not include any M&A.

Now with this, I would like to end the presentation and offer you the floor for questions and answers.

[Operator]

[Operator Instructions] Our first question is from [ Eleni ] Caldera from Bank of America.

[Unknown Analyst]

Congratulations for the results. We have 2 questions, both of which refer to the guidance. In terms of your guidance for revenues, you had a fourth quarter that was very strong and in January, it was stronger than the fourth quarter and better than the rest of the sector. What can you forecast for the rest of the year? Will you have sustainable growth throughout the year and the number of figures for the growth of guidance, just is count upon maintaining the figures for January.

And speaking about iRetail and Iguatemi 365, there's a reasonable evolution in the margin of this operation. It would be interesting to hear from you your strategy, because you do have a conservative growth of revenue.

[Guido de Oliveira, executive]

Good morning, [ Eleni ]. Now if we consider the growth of net revenue, yes. When we worked on our budget, we looked at the sales budget, of course, and the repositioning of mix as part of our portfolio, which means that, yes, we're working within that guidance. Obviously, with the growth in sales and an increase in occupancy. At present, we are at 92.9%. We should end the year at 96% of occupancy. This will bring in more revenues as well as growth in sales at the same level as we have presently.

We also have the entry of JK Mall. We had only 1 month of this mall last year. We will now have 12 months of JK. At 36% of JK enhancing and increasing our net revenue. And obviously, we're going to try to eliminate all the churn and when renewing contracts, more positive results.

The guidance stands between 13% and 18% growth for 2023. [ Eleni ], I would like to refer to the guidance for the Retail part. In terms of revenues and results, we do have guidance. When it comes to revenue, what we have said in previous quarters is that for the 365, our outlook for 2023 was to remain stable in terms of GMV and revenues for 365. We can put our foot on the accelerator while we're making so many changes, but we're speeding out the changes, the platform and the efficiency of the process as a whole.

The revenues of 365 will remain quite stable, but the results continue to come in negative, but much better than we have seen in previous years. In terms of iRetail, all of this improves and depends on the store mix. If we have more stores or less stores, the impact will be important. And the guidance reflects that change in the mix of stores.

This is what we're delivering vis-a-vis what we're starting up with. But the result of the Retail has been very significant for us, especially for iRetail as we basically deal with international brands. Even the performance that we observed in 2022 for luxury international stores is what we also observed in iRetail. We're operating some brands. Well, they're not perhaps luxury brands like Birkenstock, but they do have expressive sales and sales will increase this year.

Well, Balenciaga, which is a brand we operate with, will begin operating in midyear. So there will be a change along the way, a relevant change. And this is how our revenues behave throughout the year. we're quite positive with iRetail and Iguatemi 365. We know what we have to do with 365. We're already in the process of doing this, and we're going to launch the beta version of the platform for friends and family now in March, and the rest will be launched for the market in April.

Perhaps this is not visible to all of you, because it will have the same look, but the site efficiency will change considerably as well as the processes. So we already have a road map regarding this. And Retail continues forward strongly in January and the results will be positive for 2023.

[Operator]

Our next question is from Fanny Oreng from Santander Bank.

[Fanny Oreng Avino, analyst]

Congratulations for the results. We have 2 questions here. First, regarding the financial health of the store owners. We have had a rather turbulent situation in the mainstream area when it comes to financial health. When we look at you, you continue to have very strong sales. The collection of delinquency, which is quite impressive. What will happen between the variation of international store owners and the more mainstream store owners that are less exposed to these brands? Is this a reason of concern or not? And to do away with BRL 4 billion of vacancy in this challenging scenario seems to be very ambitious. If you could speak about the expansion of Birkenstock and which will the retail demand going forward? That's my first question.

The second question, I would better like to understand the leveraging during this year. If JK will give you a boost in this area. They have a strong cash generation, high margins. So what will happen with the company in terms of leverage at the end of the year?

[Cristina Betts, executive]

If I need to speak about the financial health of store owners and vacant areas and much more, we always speak about luxury and much more, but since the end of last year and in January and February of this year, we have had an increase of sales year-on-year of domestic compared to international stores, perhaps higher for domestic stores vis-a-vis international stores. That discrepancy, that jump, that was maintained for the international store owner seems to have equaled out, at least this is what we observed.

I mean been growing at the same pace, which is very positive for us because the Shopping Mall does not only live from international stores. They're good for this Mall, the domestic store owners are the sake of our stores and they have a very sound situation. Now what happens, there's a great deal of news about turbulence, especially in the retail market there's a great deal of news about turbulence, especially in the retail market, more focused on the middle-class, lower-income brackets, which are not part of our portfolio. Perhaps they are less relevant for our portfolio compared to the impact they will have on the segment as a whole. We keep our eye on this. We're always mapping out scenarios, what if some stores closed down. But we think that the impact will be very low for this sector of retail.

Our concern is that we have very large stores in some sites, but this is not something that will systemically impact our portfolio. Once again, we have always said that we have a public that is highly resilient to economic movements, a gain with inflation, oftentimes, the gain with the increase in interest rates. And the demand of that customer is less flexible. We see this clearly in our figures.

In theory, January was always considered to be a weaker month. We have had an incredible January. And this change of how the Brazilian client purchases from our profile from our segment, the share of wallet is more local than international, at present. We see people with more experience traveling more. But then we have the same product and we have the same price in almost all cases, a selection that continues ever more. So for those of us who are in the high end in the sector, we're calmer when it comes to this turbulence.

Now closing down vacant areas, we have had several conversations. Perhaps, we're in a segment that is more resilient. There are many people looking for space, new stores coming, international stores quite desperate to increase their GLA to increase the number of SKUs in their stores and their new brands that want to expand to the markets.

So yes, we are at a very important moment when it comes to demand for space. We went through the recession, through the pandemic. And in January, we were joking around in the company. After Black Friday and Christmas, everybody takes commissions. But this year, everybody was negotiating stores from the beach in the Northeast. They want to close up spaces to capture the growth of 2023.

I'm quite confident that we will reach that figure at the end of the year but with quality. This is our motto: to end with quality for our space, not to do this at any price. We want to do this with quality in terms of mix as well as in terms of the lease.

And we have shown this in our figures. The growth of revenue was expressive, although we closed vacant areas. Yes, we're confident, and I'll allow Guido to speak about deleveraging. But before I do so, what is important, Fanny, is that our shopping malls are quite fragmented when it comes to retail and services. We have both in the shopping mall, and one offsets the other. When services were not doing well because of the pandemic, this was offset by the retail market. And then with the resumption, we had a boom in the shopping mall. We have a diversification of the retail part and services throughout the mall. And this, of course, will fragment our risk.

We had an excellent January and February. Sales in February were the same as in January. And this points to the resiliency and the strength of brands in our portfolio.

[Guido de Oliveira, executive]

To speak about leveraging, at JK, it is around 2.7x and [indiscernible] consider the growth of year -- of the year and the guidance that we have given you and the distribution of clients at BRL 110 million and CapEx between BRL 140 million and 180 million. We will bring the leverage to below 2x at the end of the year at 1.90 or 2, which is our guidance for the year.

Now besides deleveraging, because of the company's cash generation as part of cash generation, we're also focusing on expenses as part of our strategic planning. This is significant work we're carrying out to enhance efficiency. We're especially looking at SG&A, and this should be observed during the year.

[Operator]

Our next question is from [ Igor Olgerro ] from XP.

[Unknown Analyst]

Congratulations for your results. Two questions at our end. First, which is your mindset with the idea of growth throughout 2023? You had a very good growth at the end of 2022. But if we think of the more challenging macro situation, what will happen? Any ideas regarding M&As and others? This is the first question.

The second question refers to the project of incorporation in Campinas, which is the market demand as the situation become more difficult.

[Cristina Betts, executive]

Igor, I'm going to speak about capital allocation. We continue in a very disciplined way when it comes to capital allocation. As we have mentioned in previous quarters, our preference is to look at M&A, which is the case of the JK Mall and the part of the towers, of course. We swap our part. We don't have an allocation per se. But this is something that we look upon with quite a bit of desire, and there is great demand in the inter lands and ground fields and brownfields. There are somewhat more remote at this time. There's nothing foreseen for this year.

Now we are thinking of carrying out expansions in the coming years, but this is only a moment of design, not a moment for disimbursement. We're conceding some things in terms of brownfield and greenfields. We're going to keep far from them. It's not the time for greenfield. So our greater interest perhaps is to look upon sites like JK, the shopping malls of third parties with a great deal of discipline, Igor. As you yourself mentioned, this scenario is complicated. The interest rate is complicated.

We had hoped that they would be reduced at the end of the year. This has not materialized. So we're being very careful with pricing, with assets for the assets that are on the table, which is the future outlook. We're buying assets to keep them, not to flip them. So we want to see if we can enhance the profitability of these assets. We do consider those possibilities but with a great deal of parsimony. We truly do not want to become deleveraged in the present day scenario.

Now to speak about the surroundings of the Figuera house. In our last call, if I recall properly, I did mention this. At the end of December, we were finally able to get the approvement for the incorporation of the land. And this on December 30, it was a New Year's gift that we received. And we began a bid for the infrastructure work.

In truth, we had already begun in the land of the Iguatemi Campinas land, something that we had called a prototype, the prototype of what will be the look and feel of the neighborhood that is between the shopping mall and Casa Figuera, which is the center of the neighborhood when it is under construction. It will shelter all of the sales areas, the event that will be held for that land as a whole. And the street that takes to this was already being built. Now in January, we worked a bit, we're on track and we began our bid, therefore, for the work infrastructure.

The idea is to disclose to the market what will be the schedule of that neighborhood in the month of March. But we won't begin significant selling out of this neighborhood in this first half of the year, where we have the bid that is underway for 2 towers on the other side of the highway. And of course, this will materialize this year.

But we're going to assess the market moment. As you know, this is a project that can expand for 20 years. We're in no hurry to do everything in a rush because we have to do things in a way that will make sense for us, for our partner as well. But yes, we do have to begin to work on the infrastructure. This is important. We will be announcing the beginning of infrastructure work very soon. And this is part of the CapEx that we have included in the guidance. Part of the guidance CapEx includes the money for the beginning of infrastructure in the neighborhood.

[Operator]

Our next question is from Andre Jabb from Itau BBA. Our next question is from Victor Tapia from UBS.

[Victor Tapia Migliorin, analyst]

The first point refers to cost and expenses, especially when it comes to the commercial team. Now as part of the question, there was a migration in terms of your personnel repositioning. Is there any overlap with the fourth quarter? Or when we look at this level of cost, should it become stable? This is the first part of the question.

Secondly, have you -- were you facing internal commercial difficulties because of the vacancy you had and with quality, of course, as you always mentioned, if you had that intention of reaching 95% occupancy in the fourth quarter, I believe? Where did your difficulty lie? Was it the commercial team which you have presently reinforced? And of course, it should improve and allow you to get to the end of the year closer to 95%. Or was it the demand for those areas that were not qualified according to what you wanted? This is the first question.

The second question regarding the company's digital strategy. The guidance, of course, explains this. Now when it comes to costs, is there anything to increase efficiency, further cut down on costs? Or will this be the recurrent level going forward, what we see for Iguatemi 365?

[Cristina Betts, executive]

Okay. Victor, when it comes to costs and expenses, yes, we did focus on the commercial area. We had an increase in other areas: in operations, human resources, governance. But the thick of it was for the commercial team. We wanted to reinforce our commercial team. First of all, we in-sourced those who came from outsourced hiring. And this is a change of how to work with the team. And we created a special area to help us in the discourse and the pricing. This is an important area of the commercial area, and it helps us to have speed when it comes to speaking about price tables, goals, leases and much more.

But this happened throughout the year, and the reflection of having the team is that we also had differences internally. We promoted our General Manager from JK, who is beginning now. He's excellent. Our manager in advanced marketing and media, they're carrying out incredible media work. We ended the revenues above our expectations. And every time this manager comes with better results, we demand more and more at the meetings. We say, well, let's raise the bar because it's too easy for you.

She is a very good person to lead the media team. And in February, we had the change of our Commercial VP. [indiscernible] is coming back to the company. He was part of the company for 10 years, and he's coming back as a Commercial VP. He has our background, our culture. He understands our business. He knows the store owners, and we're very confident that he will carry out important work with this team.

What we had said was to get closer to 94%, 95% occupancy rate. We lost 1% of what we had set forth to do, but it wasn't because of demand throughout the year. We had a consolidation in terms of pricing. We began the year. We had Omicron lockdown. We had a great deal of demand, but sometimes, there was that pushback of store owners in terms of the price of spaces, prices we were not willing to accept. We knew the person would be selling much more. The sales expectation was on [ X ], and the real result was not the sales ended up being much higher than expected.

I think everybody can see the results that we have posted, and to leave this behind is very difficult for the store owners. We have an important task to discuss that price. And this had an impact in terms of closing up this curve. It was not a problem with demand. You have seen the sales results of 2022. You were also seeing the beginning results of 2023, and we're going to and adequately. We're not working with outrageous prices. We're working with fair prices if we think about the sales levels.

We don't want to put the price way down and not gain any upside with the store owners. We think that this is fair. And this has become very clear for all the parties involved, and we're going to close things with greater speed. We had several contracts from the second half of last year that have reappeared for the first half of this year: Zara, Centauro, several examples that I can cite, names that we have not disclosed so far that we will disclose very soon. And we're quite confident that we will end the year at the levels mentioned by Guido.

Now when it comes to our digital strategy, once again, it's important for us to have the 365. Since we launched Iguatemi 365, our strategy is to work with curatorship of Iguatemi and take it to sites that don't have the physical space we have in Sao Paulo, Porto Alegre and other sites. 50% of the GMV without straining ourselves is in places where there is no shopping mall. We're fulfilling our role therefore. And throughout these years, we want to make sure that what is not working will begin working.

Besides looking at the platform and other processes, there's a certain cleansing out, cleansing out things that do not work in the platform or that are less efficient. And we're going to implement this throughout 2023. We don't have a full idea of what we will be doing this year. We have important work to carry out. And in 2024, we hope to be at a much better level vis-à-vis 2023. We're going to serve customers that have the Iguatemi profile but are in cities where there is no shopping mall.

Tiffany, Dolce & Gabbana, they're doing very well in regions where we have no footprint, and it makes sense to have this offer for Brazil as a whole. We don't have to sell some items that "are more commodities". They can find this in their own cities to sell something that can find makes more sense and to have that presence.

We're testing new brands when we launch brands like James Adler and Milano. They have been a success in the last semester. They don't have stores with us. And suddenly, they could. And we carry out these tests for new brands to see what it is that we can add to our mix. This to answer your first question.

We enrich our customer database, which is something that we have referred to in terms of collections and much more. Everybody that buys on the web is automatically included into Iguatemi One, and "we create a digital relationship with these people who don't come to our shopping malls every day." It allows us to be assertive in terms of what we offer. So we're moving ahead in the strategy. As with any new business, you have to make corrections along the way. This is what we're doing. We do want to serve customers with an Iguatemi profile throughout Brazil.

[Guido de Oliveira, executive]

Now to underscore what Cris stated, the new platform will bring us greater efficiency in terms of conversion, sales conversion, shopping card conversion. We will be able to activate more products during a purchase and enable us to reach a new benchmark in the industry, which is too low. This will allow us to reduce costs. And we have 3 years of learning. We're more efficient in marketing and logistics, and our negative margin has been reduced. Now this is a guidance that we will have this year to reach at least half of that negative figure we obtained in 2022 in the retail market.

[Operator]

Our next question is from Andre Mazini from Citibank.

[André Mazini, analyst]

Congratulations for the results. My question is about JK and the occupancy, which is the occupancy you can estimate. The increase in cap rate is interesting. You had a cap rate -- a full cap rate for 2022 for the fourth quarter. Now going forward in 2023, it will go up to 9%. And the JK shopping mall has celebrated 10 years of existence. Was occupancy below the average of the company, at least in the fourth quarter? It had a potential of 9.8% of average occupancy. It could be much higher. We normally do have that positive relationship with occupants. And now any additional information you can give us in occupancy and what we can expect would be very appreciated.

[Unknown Executive]

Andre, JK is only good news. As we have shown you, the cap went from 8% pre-acquisition to 10% in December. And if we look at 2023 at our budget, as we had said in December of 2021, we began to work with the shopping mall. We spent the first semester renewing the store portfolio in JK with a price of IGP-M over 20%. This, of course, took the shopping to a completely new level. And this will have a positive impact on the new leases that will come during 2023 and 2024, the 40% or a normal churn that we have in a shopping mall.

The occupancy of the mall before these renewals were below 10%. If we consider everything that we do, we can see the great avenue of growth that we have to improve the figures. 60% of the revenues per square meter of [ Sho Taka ] will be added to Iguatemi. It's the second best revenue per square meter in the country for companies that are listed based on square meter. It used to be the fifth, now it is the second, To give you an idea of the growth of the revenue per square meter through 2022. Thanks to the work that we carried out in 2021 and 2022, we now have 100% of the mall, and this will have an impact on our figures.

[André Mazini, analyst]

That's very clear. And a quick follow-up. Do you have the right for construction, not for the retail market? Are you going to make use of this line during this quarter?

[Cristina Betts, executive]

Well, the right for construction that exists belongs to the complex. We share that right to expand the square meters of the complex with WTorre. This is an agreement that we carried out when WTorre sold their stake in the shopping mall. And we were -- with the theater of Santander, we had a minority share in that theater. Yes, that potential does exist and we do plan to use the land seems right that cannot be used for the retail market. This has been exhausted but can be used for residentials, for example.

We have several conversations regarding this, nothing certain. It would represent one more tower in the complex. There's an architectural complexity there. But of course, everything makes sense there. And along with WTorre, we're considering this.

[Operator]

Our next question is from Goldman Sachs.

[Wilfredo Jorel Guilloty, analyst]

I have 2 questions. First, with the guidance that you offered, I would like to know if you have come to cost of occupancy. It's still higher than your cost before COVID. And if the cost of occupancy should increase, if it will remain the same or have a drop?

Secondly, how much more can the occupancy cost increase? I would like to better understand that pricing power that you have. There are several AAA and shopping malls that have more pricing power than others. Perhaps your cost could increase further. If you could give us some color in terms of this.

[Unknown Executive]

Jorel, our cost of occupancy vis-à-vis pre-pandemic, we are 0.8% above, still below the 2%. This is very comfortable. So in this guidance, we have a growth foreseen, and it will be 30% above 2019. Now if we consider the growth in sales, our cost of occupancy is still aligned with the growth of revenue. Because as part of the occupancy, we have the work carried out by the condominium. During 2017 and to 2022, we practically did not transfer the inflation costs. And after this period, we had an increase of 5% to 10%, much below the accrued inflation in the last 5 years based on IPCA or IGP-M.

So we're quite calm and believe the occupancy will remain at a sound level. And we do have the pricing power, as you mentioned. And the occupancy in JK, despite everything that we have done, remains at 10%. We have to work on that, increase that, and we're going to consolidate this in the main shopping malls to obtain more revenues from lease. Our condominiums are extremely healthy and very controlled when it comes in the cost of condominium per square meter. We still have room to improve this. All of our commercial tables are adjusted based on inflation.

And of course, we look for comparability with the shopping mall, with the centers, with brokers, of course. We always work based on that. It's part of our commercial education of our teams to have a pricing area simply to focus on that, and this will continue in the company.

[Operator]

Our next question is from Pedro Lobato from Bradesco BBI.

[Pedro Lobato Garcia Fernandes, analyst]

My first question, if you could give us more color regarding those tax benefits. We would like to understand how much more you can use of this in 2023, more details on that. And the second question regarding your outlet operations, which is your mindset in terms of expanding this business which will be the evolution and your reading in terms of the brands for the use of this type of channel?

[Guido de Oliveira, executive]

Pedro, when it comes to these tax benefits, we worked a great deal during 2022 to activate this benefit. Iguatemi S.A. was formerly Jereissati. It had great losses. When we absorbed this company and incorporated the shares of Iguatemi, we looked at those liabilities that had credit from the minority shareholders. We decided to activate this. So we carried out planning work for the year. We transferred revenues to Iguatemi S.A. And along with that transfer of revenues, we worked with JK.

This enabled us to activate throughout the year losses of almost BRL 200 million, giving us a gain in the last quarter of almost BRL 50 million of nondeferred taxes. If we look at the entire year, the work of activating these tax losses represents BRL 80 million.

Now what does this bring to us? The possibility of looking at our flow for 10 years based on auditing of making the best of these liabilities and an improvement in our effective tax rate. This is something that we're going to do now, make use of 30% of the base that was activated. By looking at our capital structure today in Iguatemi S.A. and Iguatemi Shopping Center, we have to maintain a tax rate of zero as part of our profit after income tax.

Strong work that we have done that will have a repercussion on our net debt. For the coming year, we should work with a average tax rate of 15%, and this will go on to 20%, 25%, below our average tax rate. This was 25% in the pre-pandemic years. We should be working with rates between 15% and 20% between '24 and '25. This is a result of the work carried out in 2022.

[Cristina Betts, executive]

Pedro, I'm going to speak about the outlets. When we began way back, we knew that the Brazilian market was not fully ready for outlets like the United States or Europe. But we did want to begin and nothing like looking over the counter to see which are the pains in the business. We learned a great deal. We have Santa Catarina and another outlet. It's not a shopping as we're used to working with. So to operate outlets does have a specific process that is different. It's different from operating a full-scale shopping mall and the type of store that will work, kind of store that will not work, several services and much more.

We have learned what works and what does not work. Both are small outlets in terms of GLA. The results have been very good. Santa Catarina outlet is now gaining an important ramp-up. We inaugurated it in the midst of the pandemic. Now it already has more competition, of course. And the timing of the opening was not so great, but we are seeking growth and maturity.

We say that this market is not ready because we don't have the retail ready to do this. We had a retail -- we had 2 types of players: one that was selling stock that had not been sold and another that was producing exclusively for outlets. The one that was selling out his inventory, hopefully, will change the profile.

To sell out your stock means a deficiency. It's natural to have a leftover of inventory. We have some store owners that sell this to multi-brands in smaller cities in the hinterlands. Now to sell directly at an outlet is more profitable than selling to multi-brands. But there's a huge amount of this. It has to be something that is under control.

This is what we're observing, this change during this year. But once again, with the creation of large groups, Arezzo growing and others growing, there is an opportunity. There's a work that is more interesting for off-price compared to the past where everything was very cyclical.

We haven't gotten to that point of being highly mature. We have tread a very significant path. But for us, it continues to be a bet for the future. It represents important learning for us and prepares us for a better market potential in the future.

We're quite satisfied with what has happened with our 2 outlets. Santa Catarina is entering a period of maturity. We have important stores opening in Santa Catarina this year besides some brands for sports goods, Pullman, Novo Hamburgo with great sales, Nike, adidas and others and some food items as well. We're considering McDonald's this year. It's in front of the railroad station in Santa Catarina. So many things are underway in the outlets, and this will be a good news for 2023. I don't know if I have answered your question.

[Pedro Lobato Garcia Fernandes, analyst]

Yes. Yes, quite a bit of detail.

[Operator]

Our next question is from Marcelo Motta from JPMorgan.

[Marcelo Motta, analyst]

Two questions at my end. If you could give us a breakdown of your occupancy rates, we're under the impression that JK and Iguatemi is working with high prices, but perhaps the maturity is what weighs more in terms of this breakdown. Second question, when we look at your CapEx, 365, will there be any significant disbursement, something that we should look at? Or will the figures remain the same?

[Cristina Betts, executive]

Motta, yes, of course, Iguatemi and JK, it's calmer to speak about occupancy rate that the babier, teenager shoppings in the hinterlands. Well, having said that and yesterday, by the way, at the Board, one of our members turned around and said we had analysts that 5 or 6 years ago would say [ Jotaka ] is a disaster area. We no longer remember those periods. But Bernardo did that way back when we would say that it was the little brother of Iguatemi. Nowadays, we all accept the new position of JK.

We're working in the hinterlands in a significant way. A shopping mall that is ahead of others, one that is moving forward more than others is [indiscernible] Preto. It is qualifying its mix and using vacant areas. We have Esplanada following its tail. So I think the babies are coming in quite strongly when we speak about that sales performance of January. This is a general performance for the portfolio 20%, 30% above 2019 in practically all of our portfolio, including the babies. So once again, it was Fanny that asked if the international stores, the Mexican stores were more important. We see a very good performance.

And to answer your question, Motta, this is important. When you look at a shopping mall with an increase in sales, even though they're in the hinterlands with national stores, there's an implicit demand for the expansion of those brands. And this is something that is entering the new markets. This is positive for us.

Where do we truly suffer? We suffer with the reduction of the audience in the surrounding areas of some malls. It has been more difficult to do away with vacant areas and then the marketplace because we're changing the face of the marketplace. We have a project for this. We're going to change the vocation of the marketplace. And there is a problem of flow as well because there are several multinational companies that have not returned to work. And there's one in our tower that although it is paying its lease, they're only going to return physically in 2024, an impossible situation.

But you see the flow has not fully returned to normalcy because of the corporate offices, and we are suffering because of the vacant things. But in the others, it will be quite balanced, the makeup of the rate -- of occupancy rate.

[Guido de Oliveira, executive]

Motta, to conclude this, the CapEx of 365 is irrelevant in this. It's just the change of the platform, only 2 million. Now here, we have maintenance of our shopping malls. We can't live without the anchoring due to the reproduction of mix that we always have. The part that we call DGI, the real state development, the approval, the maintenance of our land bank, all of this has a cost, and the beginning of infrastructure works.

As Chris mentioned, we have obtained all of our records for the Campinas land along with our partner in the shopping, which is the owner of the land. We began the infrastructure works now, and we're working with that prototype street, the [indiscernible] and we'll continue with this during the year. And beginning in the second half of the year, we should be able to send land fractions along with national developers. This is part of a CapEx that is very similar to previous CapEx in 2022. As you can see in our release, it was around BRL 140 million. So we're very close to what we have worked with historically.

[Operator]

Ladies and gentlemen, as we have no further questions, we will give the floor to Ms. Betts for her final remarks. You may proceed, ma'am.

[Cristina Betts, executive]

Thank you very much for your attendance, for the questions. Andrea, if you want to speak to us offline, we will answer your questions offline. Once again, we're extremely satisfied with our results for 2022. I would like to congratulate the team, the entire team of Iguatemi. They worked a great deal during the first year. We have a more professional structure with committees and much more, all of the work of withdrawing discounts. We worked on several fronts this year. All the events resuming, media is back, structural events, marketing at full steam. We're making connections, and we did have a great deal of important things happening: the issuance of equity, the acquisition of JK. Congratulations to everybody. It was an incredible year, and we're quite optimistic for 2023.

The IR team and the financial team, myself and Guido are at your entire disposal for further questions. Thank you for your time today. We will speak the coming quarter. Thank you all.

[Operator]

With this, we conclude the Iguatemi conference call. Thank you all for your participation. You can now disconnect.